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It's Officially Oscar Pre-Season, and This is the Year You're Gonna Be All Over It. Here's How.

Every year, it's the same: right around this time, that hopeful chill in the fall air drives us into a movie theatre. We buy tickets for one of the juicy big dramas of the year--I bet you anything we've all penciled in Argo for this weekend. We emerge two hours later like, OH. Yeah. I just saw Argo. Look out, water cooler conversation. Best-picture-category perfect run, here I come!

It's pre-season hubris, people. You know it is, and you know how it ends--cut to all of us in February, shifting in our seats at an Oscars party as nine other films we didn't see are discussed, thinking SomebodytalkaboutArgo, SomebodytalkaboutArgo, SomebodytalkaboutArgo.

Because we got sidetracked by pumpkin patches, holiday shopping and Saturday-long Bravo marathons, and we never saw another nominated film again.

How about you change that right now? With us. Together.

Set yourself up for film-nerd success with these pre-season tips:

1. Utiltize the weekday twilight showing. I swear by this--don't wait for the weekend to go to the movies. If you can hit an early-evening after-work show on a weekday, you'll be out in time to catch primetime TV and you'll feel like you cheated the system. It's like going to spinning at lunchtime--but with more sitting down. Much more blessed, glorious sitting down.

2. Don't double back yet. Yes--films like Moonrise Kingdom and The Dark Knight Rises will probably get noms. Sometimes the type-As among us feel like "I can't go see X, I didn't even see Y yet and it came out months ago." No! The spring and summer guys will be out on DVD before the awards (Moonrise comes out Oct. 16!). You can watch them in January, when you wouldn't leave your house for a million dollars. So go see the new stuff guilt-free.

3. But speaking of double, now's the time to go back-to-back. I'm not talking about two thinky Oscary films in a row, though. Stave off but-I-wanna-see-the-fluffy-pic guilt by watching, say, The Master first, then having Pitch Perfect for dessert. (Or, you know, Here Comes the Boom. I don't judge your love of Kevin James.)

4. Attention, procrastinators: don't you dare plan on the all-day catch-up session. I know, I know. It sounds like an OK idea. All day at the movie theater the week before the Academy Awards, churning through 12 hours of film. No. NO. Your eyes will burn, your legs will cramp, and I guarantee you at the end of the day, the only thing you'll remember is how much it smelled like socks in there.